Sexuality and Women's Body Image: Sizing Us Up

Every time I speak in front of a group of women, I’m taken by the beautiful diversity of their individual selves. Of course, there’s the hypnotic variety of skin tones, facial features and hair colors and textures, that testify to the infinite garden of racial, ethnic and cultural diversity that flavors the human condition. But there’s also, invariably, a breath-taking array of body sizes, and I’m always so pleased to see those women who wear their sizes, the largest to the smallest, with love and pride.

No matter our size, there’s a vital case to be made for maintaining a “healthful” body weight, whatever that might be, based upon a variety of factors like age, height, individual and family history and so on. And certainly, maintaining a healthy relationship with one’s "numbers" including those associated with blood pressure and blood glucose levels, both of which are tied to size and weight, can be absolutely essential to staying alive.

But as far as sheer appearance and sense of self are concerned, like so many of women in the US and elsewhere, I’ve scuffled with this weight thing for as long as I can remember, sometimes impatient with my family’s tendency towards being “pleasingly plump” as my beautiful and pleasingly plump Nana used to say.

But especially now, when January 1^st’s resolutions to trim it all down have begun their inevitable wane, a smart young woman who’s close to my heart thought a post about sex and size - not penis size, mind you - might just be in order.

LGBTQI Civil Rights: A King's Legacy

It’s hard to believe, but as we prepare to celebrate another birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we’re still embroiled in the struggle for human rights in the US. This at a time when we’re on the cusp of the second inauguration of the nation’s first President of color.

In the spirit of Dr. King, many of us still actively work for the day when the infinite rainbow of human diversity is universally celebrated, cherished and protected, rather than resented or merely tolerated. After all, as folk who’ve heard me lecture know I’m fond of saying, one tolerates a headache and waits for it to go away. Our response to the richness of racial, cultural, gender and sexual orientation diversity needs to be way more positive, nurturing and celebratory than that!

Color and Sensuality: A Different Kind of Color-Struck

Back in the 70s, neither condoms nor dildoes came in so many pretty colors. Flavors, maybe. But colors? Not so much. But then, today and always, colors and their influence in the world we call home, continue their complex shaping of the way we live our lives.

What do I mean? Well, take for example, the movement to fight breast cancer. By now, most of us are familiar with the breast cancer prevention movement’s use of the color pink as a binding force for its fundraising and awareness campaigns, thanks to a savvy dedicated marketing effort that’s been highly successful. Pink ribbons, pink bras, pink accoutrements of every kind pervade our daily lives in the service of this very important cause. As a matter of fact, as I write this post, my favorite pink-over-stainless-steel drinking mug, embossed with the Breast Cancer Research Foundation’s pink ribbon, sits where I can reach it on the desk beside my keyboard. 

Long considered a color connoting the delicate, and some might say ineffectual, lady-like essence of frail femininity, in the fight against breast cancer, pink has morphed, almost before our eyes, into a color connoting power, solidarity, bravery in the face of the scariest of odds, and warrior-women’s hopes. And yes, in case you were wondering, there really are breast cancer themed pink glass dildoes!

Body Changes in Menopause: Vita Nova

Vita Nova is Latin for new life. Kudos to my beautiful and brilliant 88 year old mom, a retired teacher of Latin, for that! She is not, however, pictured above.

As all of us embark upon a shiny new year, full of "vita nova," promise and reflection, and an optimism that often blooms in the shadow of residual fears, it seems natural to talk of new beginnings. And how timely, then, to talk about one of the most exciting new beginnings of all – menopause!

While myths and folklore abound, sometimes it’s a little tricky trying to actually pin down what we mean when we talk about menopause. Of course, all of us know the basics, right? It’s the time when one’s monthly period comes to a quiet end, and unless we enter menopause surgically, for example by having a hysterectomy, it’s a process that tends to take awhile, one that begins with natural, normal changes in our hormones. It’s a hugely important issue and one that women frequently say that they’d like to know more about.